The garment industry, like many other industries, is increasingly undergoing automation in order to improve efficiencies and quality in the design and manufacturing of garments. It is now well known to provide automatic garment manufacturing machines, such as automated cutting and stitching machines, which include computers that store a digitized pattern. In turn, the computers instruct the garment manufacturing machine to perform its task according to the stored pattern. Thus, an automated cutting machine can be instructed by the computer to cut particular patterns, while the automated stitching machine can be instructed by the computer to sew particular patterns and/or along certain seams and/or according to various types of threads. In this manner, one computer can instruct multiple machines to help produce garments of consistent size, pattern and quality. However, in order for the computer to issue these “instructions”, the desired pattern must first be inputted into the computer, so that the computer knows what pattern is to be used to guide the cutting and sewing machines through their operations. As part of the digitizing process, key garment pattern elements specific to the industry should be both properly identified and formatted to the American Society for Testing and Materials/American Apparel Manufacturing Association-Drawing Interchange (ASTM/MMA-DXF) file standard. This collation is necessary in order for the output file to be useable by garment industry CAD systems.
While the automation of garment manufacturing machines is well established, there are many deficiencies in the areas of pattern digitization and the recognition of industry specific elements.
It is known to enter a garment pattern into the computer using an electromechanical system known as a manual digitizing table that can detect the position of a manually movable input stylus known as a “puck”. More particularly, the user lays the garment pattern onto the digitizing table. Using the puck, the operator can input the dimensions and features of a garment pattern into the computer. There is much human input involved in this procedure, causing it to be a slow and error-prone method of digitizing a garment pattern.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,887,903, issued Jun. 3, 1975, describes a digitizing table for manually inputting the digital coordinates representing both the boundary of the pattern piece and industry specific elements such as turn points, grain lines, notches, drill holes, etc. While this system is accurate in representing the complete details of a garment pattern, the input process is completely manual. This process can be applied to both “cut out” and “non-cut out” patterns.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,575,628, issued Mar. 11, 1986, describes a scanner for semi-automated digitizing of a pattern piece. Prior to scanning the piece, manual pre-marking is required of industry specific elements including turn points, grain lines, notches, drill holes, etc. While this semi-automated process is faster than a completely manual process, the pre-marking of the pattern's industry specific elements slows the total processing time significantly. Further, this process can only be applied to “cut out” patterns, but not “non-cut out” patterns. In addition, this system does not automatically detect and format ASTM/AAMA pattern elements necessary to the garment industry.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,554,635, issued Nov. 19, 1985, describes a process for a marker making system for laying out patterns, mainly to make ventilation ducts in the duct mark identifying, coupled with automated CAD abilities for drafting new patterns based on user input parameters. However, in this patent, an operator must manually input specific information, and so the system does not automatically recognize pattern elements. Similarly, U.S. Pat. No. 6,298,275, issued Oct. 2, 2001, describes a process for temporarily identifying cut sheet material through the use of a signal generation. Both systems can identify individual pieces through border paths detection, but neither has the ability to recognize specific elements within the pieces.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,537,946, issued Jul. 23, 1996, describes a sewing system which captures the image of the pattern piece to be sewn, and analyzes and measures the location of all the edges of the part, using a man-machine interface for inputting sewing parameters such as stitch size and distance of the stitch from the edge. All data is then used to generate therefrom a sewing program for sewing the part along its edges. This system, however, does not have the ability to export pictures directly to software programs used extensively in the garment industry.
There are still further disadvantages of prior art methods of garment patternmaking. For example, as part of the manual patternmaking process, current industry practices involve transfers of the pattern piece representations back and forth between white paper patterns and cutout patterns. As an additional example, in the garment industry it is common to keep “rubbings” of the actual garment prototype. These images are used as a communication tool between work groups in the production environment. However, the quality of the information conveyed through this medium is inadequate for garment industry purposes.
The purpose of digitizing a garment pattern is mainly to generate a digital output file for use with either garment CAD or grading systems. CAD systems allows designers and pattern makers to make adjustments to a pattern piece. Grading systems allow production managers to efficiently create a full size range of patterns from a single base pattern. In either process, substantial time savings can be gained over their manual alternatives by use of a fully automated digitizing system.
As part of the digitizing process, key garment pattern elements specific to the industry must be both properly identified and formatted to the ASTM/AAMA-DXF file format standard. The elements defined in this format include but are not limited to boundary line, turn points (also known as corner points), curve points, notches, grade reference lines, alternate grade reference lines, mirror lines, grain lines, internal lines, stripe reference lines, plaid reference lines, internal cutouts, drill holes, sew lines, cut lines and fold lines. This collation is necessary in order for the output file to be usable by garment industry CAD and grading systems.
Digitizing a garment pattern is also useful for pattern correction. Traditionally, pattern making and correction has been done by hand. Artisans with extensive training have been needed to achieve the delicate curves required, particularly at finer levels of garment production. This manual process is performed by the pattern maker using a pencil or pen to draw directly on a pattern piece, with corrections being made by hand to change the existing boundary and/or internal elements specific to the garment industry.
CAD systems have been modified to allow operators to perform similar technical corrections. First, however, a hand drafted pattern must be digitized into the system before an operator can make the corrections. As patterns become more complex, however, CAD systems do not have the capability to make fine adjustments at the same quality level as manual pattern correction. Working at this level of detail, CAD systems tend to lose either time, efficiency or quality.
A fully automated digitizing system is also useful for grading. Grading encompasses the process of generating a full size range of patterns from a single base size. For example, if the base pattern size is a size 8, a size range is created by drafting identically shaped patterns that are proportionately larger or smaller to produce the corresponding sizes 2, 4, 6, 10, 12, 14, 16. Computer grading systems have been developed to automate the drafting of pattern size ranges based on a sample pattern. First, however, a hand drafted pattern must be digitized into the system before an operator can begin the grading process. While computerized grading is extremely efficient at generating multiple size ranges from a single pattern, the process requires that grade movement be calculated and manually assigned to multiple locations prior to processing. This mandatory step is time consuming and can only be done by operators highly skilled in the art. U.S. Pat. No. 5,757,661, issued May 26, 1998, describes a computer system which automatically generates grading rules from a measurement scale in order to perform the grading requirements for garment patterns. However, this patent does not describe a method for automatically identifying grade points and does not describe a method for automatically assigning grade point numbers.
Finally, a fully automated digitizing system is useful for garment cataloging. Taking a picture of a garment has been a means for production managers to convey a description of the product to manufacturers. It is commonplace in the garment industry to take a single picture at a distance in order to capture the general details of a garment. Additionally, a series of tiled pictures are taken at close range in order to capture the finer details of the garment. While the information obtained from this procedure is reasonably useful, the process is time consuming and the output is difficult to collate. Also, the level of detail within each picture is inflexible (i.e., there is no “zoom” feature).
Finally, garment CAD and grading systems typically use a monitor in conjunction with a mouse-type input control device to maneuver the on screen pointer needed to operate an application. Whether the user is digitizing, pattern correcting, or grading, these systems generally incorporate a “heads-up” display interface where to effect an adjustment, the operator looks up at the display monitor and coordinate a mouse on a separate plain of operation. In some procedures the operator attempts to use this process to duplicate the same effect produced naturally by drafting pen on paper. Satisfactory results are difficult to achieve because again the viewer display is on a different plane of operation than the mouse. While this is considered the current state of the art for input control devices, it requires a deft hand and considerable practice on the part of the operator to achieve satisfactory results.